MLB Partners with the Big Three Independent Leagues
With the announcements this week that MLB was extending its existing relationship with the Atlantic League and designating the Atlantic League, Frontier League, and American Association as “Partner Leagues,” MLB’s vision for the destruction of restructuring minor-league baseball has become a little more clear.
Not a lot, just a little.
The current PBA between MiLB and MLB expires in five days. If nothing else, these agreements have reduced what little leverage existing teams have to almost none.
As Baseball America noted, this could be a watershed moment. After all, the independent leagues were effectively born out of the ashes from the last time MLB-MiLB clashed in 1990-91.
To paraphrase Miles Wolff—the godfather of the indys—they have the players but we have the stadiums. Wolff was referring to MLB’s demand to upgrade facilities then, which also helped give birth to the stadium boom in the 1990s; as affiliated teams left City A for City B, an independent team would fill the vacancy in City B.
I think it’s safe to say these agreements will make it much harder for teams shut out of “The 120” (assuming, of course, that’s still in play) to shift to the independent model, and probably impossible for them to join these three leagues without the blessing of Herr Manfred and/or his minions.
Of course, God is in the details, and right now there’s a whole lot of atheism going on.
We don’t know, for example, how MLB plans to cross-promote and cross-market these leagues. We do know that MLB plans to take over the statistical services (read: analytical data), which will make it easier for teams to scout these leagues (and presumably acquire players).
We also don’t know if this was done with a vision of providing a place for undrafted collegiate players. In the previous link, BA reminds us that the original vision for the Frontier League was for players in their early 20s with an age limit of 27. Indeed, many independent leagues had roster rules designed to prevent teams from loading up on AA and AAA castoffs.
With the First-Year Player draft likely to be just 20-25 rounds, there’s going to be a couple hundred players in need of a place to play. This could help funnel those players to a place to play (and for a very low rate of pay!).
About the only thing we do know is that MLB’s “One Baseball” Plan appears to be well underway and that baseball below the major leagues will be inexorably altered.
While these moves obviously have Manfred’s blessing, these steps to change the course of minor league and indy ball are really detail oriented and appear to be following a defined plan. Who is the MLB executive calling these shots?
Before he was forced out as the Astros GM, it was my understanding that Jeff Luhnow had been the catalyst behind the MLB movement to restructure minor league baseball because it was “inefficient”. This made sense because Luhnow (who is a world-class prick) background was as a business consultant and not working his way up through a baseball front office as a former player, coach or scout. Luhnow has been banished from the game; so, who is carrying the flag now for this and making the critical micro-level decisions that will have a significant impact on the future structure of professional baseball?
From what I gather, for any move Houston has made, Milwaukee and Baltimore have been right behind them like a pair of Welsh Corgis. FWIW, Luhnow’s MLB suspension is up in January. I would not be surprised whatsoever if he were to be put in charge of the minor leagues.
Great photo!
Over the past few weeks, have noticed a several players drafted in later rounds that have had solid and some great MLB careers (Smoltz, Roy Oswalt, Mark Buerhle, Ryne Sandberg, Mike Piazza) or even current players (Brandon Kintzler, Kevin Pillar, Kevin Kiermaier, Tyler Flowers, Seth Lugo, Zach Davies, Adam Eaton), and the immediate thought is that under the current system (10 round MLB draft) and future system (20 round draft) lots of those guys either wouldn’t have gotten a shot, or would’ve balked at playing in an “affiliated league” with the hope of catching the eye of an MLB team.
I’m more concerned with the other side of the equation. I’m no draft expert, so feel free to contradict me, but my take is that only the very, very elite HS players are going to be drafted now. And there are fewer places for them to play (and for which they basically have to pay). Will that swell the JC ranks? It seems extremely unlikely that any of them will try (or be able to) bypass college in favor of going straight to the “affiliated” leagues. I’m not even sure that distinction matters — from MLB’s point of view, the affiliated players are like regular employees and the partner players are like contractors or interns.